Steven Spielberg's 'War Horse' - a Film Review

COMMENTARY | There are only two ways to approach Steven Spielberg's "War Horse," depending on whether one is sentimental about animals or not. This is by deliberate design by the great director who does not use half measures when eliciting emotions.

If one is an animal lover, especially of horses, then one should be prepared to shed tears and in abundance. The sufferings of Joey, the half thoroughbred who is unfortunate enough to be in the British Army during the early months of the First World War, will have more teenage girls sobbing than were sighing over Edward the vampire.

But even if one, like Sarah Palin and your humble servant, believes that there is a place for animals next to the mashed potatoes, there are some pleasures to be found in "War Horse." The cinematography is lush. The score mostly composed by the venerable John Williams, evocative of Vaughn Williams, is sumptuous. There is some interesting slices of life vignettes as Joey gallops from one situation to another.

Joey moves from the care of Albert, the son of a foolish Devonshire tenant farmer who really needed to buy a plow horse, to a British cavalry officer, two a pair of German soldiers who make the bad mistake of deserting, to a sickly French farm girl and her grandfather, to another German soldier, and finally to a British aid station.

The best sequence, from the point of view of the movie viewer who is unsentimental about animals, is one in which Joey is part of the British cavalry regiment. The British were of the opinion that the cavalry was the great decider of battles, just as at Waterloo. The British Colonel who expresses this opinion was wrong about Waterloo -- just remember what happened to the French who they charges the British squares -- but was especially wrong in an era of machine guns and rapid fire artillery. The battle sequences are toned down from the "Saving Private Ryan" level of carnage and almost no major character dies on screen

The second best sequence occurs when the British and the Germans leave off trying to kill each other to save Joey from being entangled in barbed wire in No Man's Land. One hopes that Collin and Peter both survive the war and meet again under better circumstances.

"War Horse" is not Spielberg's best movie, but by far it is not his worst either. It should be worth two hours and 20 minutes of one's time.

Source: War Horse, Yahoo Movies